Burden of Friendship

This seminal noise band from Chicago
existed into the early and mid-80's, until it morphed into several other
bands, including Err Or Correction, Research Defense Squad, and Staklo.

The line-up included (at various
times) Robert St. Clair, William Meehan, Scott Marshall, Doug Brown, Mark Giangrande, James
Koehnline, Paul Rosen, and others too numerous and/or minor to list
here. The band has scattered to the various corners of the United
States. Scott Marshall now lives in New York City working as an
artist and musician; James Koehnline works in the Seattle,
Washington area as an artist; Robert St. Clair lives in the Detroit as a
hotel service worker and artist; Doug Brown passed away several years ago and is missed by his friends; William Meehan still
lives in the Chicago area, as does Paul Rosen (we assume).

BOF had many friends who would come on
stage or rehearse with the core members. The first show was at the
Noise Factory on West Lake Street as part of the 666 Show, a multiband
extravaganza featuring Ono, Dementia 13, End Result, Algebra Suicide, Pile
of Cows, and others. That show took place on August 30, 1984.
There is a videotape of the show that survives to this day.

The band played in various well known
Chicago venues such as Batteries Not Included, Lucky Number, Exit,
Gaspar's, and Metro. The shows would be a combination of music,
noise, and performance art. Much of the music was rehearsed at
Scott's haunted coach house on Ravenswood, just off of Greenleaf Street,
or in the studios of WZRD-FM where several of the band members were staff
DJ's. There, band and friends would take over the airwaves and
perform live along with a combination of turntables, cassette players, and
microphones, emanating from Studios A, B, and C, the record library room,
the hallways, and anywhere there was space for an instrument, clanging
pieces of metal, or shattering dishes.

As Scott Marshall puts it:

We came together at WZRD in 1984, and that we were
probably the city's very first improv-noise-art ensemble. As such, we were
hugely influential to the next generation of musicians and the whole
electronic-improv scene as well. I really believe that. Both Dan Burke and
Jim O'Rourke once told me that they would listen to our "Voidwatches"
late at night when they were youngsters in high school. Jim O'Rourke
opened for one of our dates at Batteries Not Included when he was 16 years
old (and there were about 5 people watching us play). Also, Mike Krause
was totally inspired and influenced by our work, as well as by the
cassettes on my Panic Records and Tapes label. Mike is still doing noise
shows in Chicago, still booking shows, and is still involved with WZRD as
well. Our first-ever live performance at the Noise Factory was influential
too. You may remember that a very young Urge Overkill was on that date of
groups. In addition, when we were active 1984-85, there were only about
two or three out-of-the-way saloons where we could get away with our
schtick. But within ten years after that, there was a plethora of spaces
and musicians doing that kind of thing, and now Chicago has something of a
reputation of a swingin' improv and experimental music scene. I honestly
believe that BOF played a large part in that; not that what we were doing
was so brilliant or anything, but that we were doing the right thing at
the right time, and I just don't think Chicago ever had anyone doing that
sort of thing before.

It should also be mentioned that Eric Leonardson, Lou
Mallozzi, and a few others started Experimental Sound Studios at about the
same time or a year or two after BOF's brief existence. Of course, ESS is
not a band or a performance space, but that place did, and still does,
play its own part in fostering a healthy atmosphere for sonic
experimentalism in Chicago (a low-cost recording studio co-op).

Doug Brown remembers how the band got its
name:

We
were booked to play at that first show (hey, we/Scott/Bob booked the other
bands so we got to book ourselves, too) and Bob was worried that RDS would
not be as good as the concept in his mind so we became BOF because it was
such a burden to be in a band and be friends and all that shit.
And it became [an] ego trip anyway with the smashing of light bulbs over
hooded Scott's back. Did you or any of us ever understand why we did
that? Jeff Bale from Maximum Rock & Roll in California,
visiting with Terry Nelson, stormed the stage as we ended and took the
mike and admonished the audience "You guys liked that pretentious art
shit? Fuck, you guys are lame" and we just grinned.... Punk
had earlier influenced us to know that bands could be anybody and anybody
could be in a band. But we were not good enough to be a band so we
played noise until we had delusions of bandeur. BOF became an entity
wider than (not greater than) RDS, that RDS really stood for really drunk
shitkickers, and that BOF also stood for boring old farts (eventually).

MUSIC FILES

Here is a sample of the band recorded
live at the original Exit on Wells Street in Chicago on December 15th, 1985:

Burden of Friendship rarely performed cover songs, Like A Virgin being the only other. The band recorded a version of Mercy by Wire in August of 1987 and performed it live around the same time at Batteries Not Included. Here is a copy of Mercy rescued from cassette:

The next piece is an excerpt from one of the earliest Voidwatch performances at WZRD. This one comes from the first 45 minutes of an almost 7 hour recording from April 27, 1984. The voice at the end of the clip is that of Doug Brown as it was his show that night. More information about these get togethers is available from New City in an article called Escape From Noise: Is This Not Music?

At Home With The Burdens was recorded at Mark's apartment in 1986 while the band was hanging out on a weekend afternoon.The first several layers were recorded without the band realizing it. Each layer, seven in all, were recorded in real time, a few backwards. It wasn't until the fourth or fifth layer when everyone figured it out. This version is an April 2015 remix of the entire piece.

This next piece is a bit epic given the work that went into it. The track was recorded by Scott, Doug, and Mark at Mark's apartment on Bernard Street in 1986. It was meant to be a backing piece for a live performance by Scott on November 1, hence the alternative name Novone.